


like a drowning man

by sterlingsparrow



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Angst, Kissing, M/M, usual valvert makeout at the barricades
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-16
Updated: 2019-07-16
Packaged: 2020-06-29 16:49:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19834435
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sterlingsparrow/pseuds/sterlingsparrow
Summary: “They are expecting me,” Valjean says against Javert’s mouth. He pushes himself away, but Javert still holds him. “Inspector, please.”“Do not call me that.” Javert’s voice is ragged.





	like a drowning man

**Author's Note:**

> sorry for such a pretentious title for 300-some words but I was writing & was like 'OH'

“You are free,” he says, and one moment Javert is staring at him with disbelief and the next the old policeman has flung himself upon Valjean, cupping his hands around his face and pressing their mouths together. It is a violent, desperate, needy thing, like a drowning man gasping for air. Valjean’s own hands come up and grab Javert’s collar.

At last they part, both panting. Valjean rests his clean forehead against Javert’s dirty one.

“Why?” he whispers. Javert’s hands tighten around his jaw.

“I do not know.”

The man’s voice is broken and beaten down, the likes of which Valjean has only heard once before: when Javert begged his dismissal from Madeleine. A shiver runs down his spine.

He pulls Javert close again. This time when their lips meet, it is gentle, tentative. Even so, it lasts just as long as the first kiss, and they still clutch at each other. He tastes blood on Javert’s tongue and wonders just what the schoolboys have done to him.

“They are expecting me,” Valjean says against Javert’s mouth. He pushes himself away, but Javert still holds him. “Inspector, please.”

“Do not call me that.” Javert’s voice is ragged.

“Then what should I call you?”

The man does not answer, simply drops his hands and touches his lips with a blank look. Valjean takes another step backwards. He takes the pistol in hand. Javert flinches, but Valjean simply raises it to the sky and shoots.

“Go,” he says. “My address is No. 7, Rue de l’Homme Arme. I will be there when all this is over, under the name Fauchelevent.”

Javert nods once. Then he takes off running. Jean Valjean walks back to the barricade with a heavy heart, says “It is done”, and takes a seat opposite a wall.

To find Marius, and then to home. Then he shall deliver himself to Javert, and all will be right with the world.

_‘Inspector, please.’_

_‘Do not call me that_. _’_

Valjean remembers the expression on Javert’s face—or rather, the lack of one—and the brokenness he exhibited for the second time. _No,_ he muses. _Not everything will be right_.

**Author's Note:**

> a disclaimer I'm putting at the end of my fics from now on: kudos & comments are lovely, but my anxiety makes it hard to respond to comments & i usually don't. thanks for understanding :)


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